mifunesamurai
I purchased this movie for my wife who has horses and just loves them dearly. When she decided to watch it one lazy afternoon, I joined her with the intention of taking a nap on the lounge. But this movie kept me awake! An interesting production from South Africa made by a very Christian filmmaker, Regardt van den Bergh. I'm not one for religious films and this film only dealt with Christian issues in a very subtle matter. What was the intriguing aspect of the film is the relationship between the human and their approach to understanding the language of the horse. This is known as the horse whisperer, a practice preached by the likes of Pat Parelli and Monte Roberts. Only true horse lovers will know who these amazing horse whisperers are, and their methods.The young university student, Pierre, has a crises with his health that sees him drop out of his track team. He spirals into depression and decides to throw it all away. But then he decides to focus his attention on his love for horses. This interest is never clearly set out in the script but only hints on it with photographs and horse posters. Maybe if it spent more time with Pierre's past admiration for horses would have helped that strong connection.The turning point comes when Pierre makes connection with a wild Arabian horse, Tornado, who inflicts self harm to itself. Pierre understands the suffering of the horse and tracks down a horse whisperer from the outback of Kalahari to help Tornado. What the whisperer attempts to achieve is bring boy and horse together as one, and does this with great patience and wisdom. But has Pierre the patience that many a youth don't understand? Director Regardt captures this with an excellent visual style and an understanding of telling an emotional story. Some may see it as very slow moving, but the deliberate pace gives us time to get into the characters, including the horse. I'm sure those involved in the production would have watched Ballard's The Black Stallion, the film every horse lover should watch. It had the same stylistic feel to it and pace.My wife was impressed and will be screening the movie at the next stable meeting. For me, it was an interesting find and a very well made South African production.
